Long Road Home
by kate the valiant
Summary: Shenko one-shot. Kaidan finds it difficult to cope with Shepard's death at the explosion of the Citadel, but is able to put that aside while working on repairing the Normandy. Returning to Earth, however, is another story.


Earth rebuilt itself faster than Kaidan could have ever hoped. He stepped through the hatch into a crisp September Vancouver morning (was there really an edge of ash to the air or was he just imagining it from the last time?) and almost found himself smiling as he looked out at the cleared roadways and the rigging that had gone up for rebuilding. Almost.

It was good to be home, even if it was all still under heavy reconstruction months later. He wasn't sure how happy he was capable of being after he'd hung that last name on the crew deck's memorial, but he tried. It had hit so much worse this time. He'd just gotten her back. Why did they have to take her again? What right did they have? She was his. He was hers. It shouldn't have fallen to anyone else to separate them.

But she was gone, and this time she wasn't coming back. And the knowledge had hollowed him out, made him cold and burning at the same time and he wasn't sure anymore which was worse.

Between him, Tali, Garrus, and what was left of the _Normandy_'s crew, the ship's repairs had only taken several weeks, though they'd felt so long on their vast, uninhabited planet. He'd liked the distraction, though, even though it only rarely took his mind off of her and when he remembered he was hit all the worse by the loss. But it passed the time and it got them offworld and to the nearest mass relay ― which, while it wasn't operational, was in the middle of being repaired by a crew who had come by way of one that was. Weeks again later, they'd finally reached home, or what was left of it.

And, for once, the sun was shining.

The repair crew had sent word ahead, since the _Normandy's_ comm units were down, and Hackett came out to meet them himself and, unexpectedly, smiling. "Rear Admiral Alenko. It's good to see you in one piece."

"_Admiral_?" Kaidan asked, raising his brows as he shook Hackett's hand. "When did that happen?"

"Posthumously, or so we thought. I'm glad we were wrong." He smiled at that.

"So am I, sir. It's just a shame I couldn't attend the ceremony." They started to walk, though Kaidan wasn't sure where they would be going. "How's reconstruction progressing?"

"Slowly," Hackett admitted, "but well. Everyone's pitched in as best as they can, and we're trying our best to keep track of the dead and missing and the unclaimed bodies, but it's hard. We lost a lot of people."

"I can imagine." They'd left Earth for months, and millions had died just in the first days. He followed Hackett for blocks, weaving through construction and a surplus of refugees. All of the fleets had been marooned in Sol as well, and from what the repair crew had said it was a messy business from the beginning with a shortage of supplies on all sides and of all kinds.

They walked, chatting amiably, but every few seconds he would turn to look at Kaidan strangely, as if he were wondering why he wasn't acting differently. He had to speed to a brisk walk to keep pace with him and Hackett asked suddenly, "Have you heard?"

"Heard what?"

"About...you know?" As if that would help. He found his patience shortening quickly. "What's going on?"

"...You'll see." Hackett refused to answer any more of his questions. He followed Hackett into a hospital full to bursting. They hurried up two floors in the elevator and across another wing until he stood in a room of recovering wounded, many of them amputees, working with instructors. Those who were Alliance recognized Hackett and saluted ― and, if they recognized him, gaped. Kaidan was beginning to wonder what in this room was such a cause for hurry when he saw her, almost tucked into a corner, struggling to walk as she braced herself on a pair of parallel bars. No, but it couldn't be. It couldn't.

She must have noticed the sudden quiet, then, because she turned to look and he knew he had to be crazy or dreaming or _something_. Kaidan dug his nails into the palms of his hands, just a little pinch, it should have been enough to wake him, but he didn't. Milo Shepard stared at him in much the way he must have been staring at her.

"...Kaidan?"

He ran to her, making a strangled and desperate sound that took a moment to register as a sob. He picked her up easily but gently and she wrapped her arms around his neck and laughed. He held her close and he kissed and kissed and kissed her and spun her a little and touched her face and her hair and her back and kissed her until his arms were sore from holding her and he'd cried so badly he'd given himself a headache and even more after that.

Then she took her crutches (they'd tried to put her in a wheelchair, she told him, but she wouldn't let _that_ stand for more than a week) and they walked back to her room so that they could close the door and just sit, comfy and warm and together, on her bed. Milo tucked her head under his chin and he draped his arms around her waist. All they could say for a while was _I love you, I love you, I love you_. It was so good just to hear her voice again, to know that he'd be hearing her voice for a long time yet, that he could say those words and hear her respond with them.

And then Kaidan told her about the long road home to her, and how he'd thought he'd lost her, and how much it hurt to have to remember that he wouldn't see her again, and she told him the same, only she had a tale about a nebulous, otherworldly child and the options it gave her and how _hard_ it had been to do what she knew she had to do. It was easier, though, when she thought of Saren and the Illusive Man.

But then she'd woken up in the rubble, if only for a few hazy minutes, and it had all felt like a dream. But the Reapers were gone, and the mass relays were shorted out, too. EDI and the geth, though, had been fine. She couldn't explain it ― maybe it was fate, dumb luck, maybe the _thing_ was just a construct of the Reapers.

"I missed you," she murmured as she finished and pressed her mouth gently to his. Kaidan brushed the hair back from her forehead, smiling softly and kissing her back.

"Missed you too. I'm glad I don't have to." Milo laughed a little and he could have died, he was so happy to hear it. He was scared he'd forget what it sounded like.

"Me too." She rested her forehead against his, and he closed his eyes, just enjoying the feel of her, the smell of her, the weight of her in his lap. Nothing was as perfect as her or this moment, and even though she was broken and bruised and burned, she was healing and she was whole and she was _alive_ and she was his and he was so, so very happy.


End file.
